Expression control using a regulatable intron
AssigneeAskbio Inc.
InventorGraham Whyteside
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
The present invention relates to the use of a regulatory nucleic acid sequences that are able to regulate gene expression in eukaryotic cells and which are responsive to the unfolded protein response (UPR). There are disclosed regulatable introns and UPR-inducible promoters, which are able to regulate gene expression. There are also disclosed recombinant expression constructs comprising such regulatory nucleic acid sequences, whereby expression of the encoded expression product can be induced by invoking the unfolded protein response (UPR) in a eukaryotic cell containing the construct, methods of using such constructs and associated vectors, cells and suchlike.
Claims14
A synthetic nucleic acid expression construct comprising a nucleic acid comprising a sequence encoding an expression product, the sequence encoding an expression product comprising a sequence which encodes a regulatable intron, said regulatable intron being an intron which comprises an excisable sequence which is capable of being spliced out of a transcript produced from the synthetic expression construct via the unfolded protein response (UPR) system in the cell, thereby resulting in a transcript encoding a functional expression product, wherein the regulatable intron comprises the sequence CNG/CNG-Xn-CNG/CNG, wherein Xn represents a sequence of length n bases, wherein/represents a cleavage site and wherein the sequence CNG-Xn-CNG is excised from the transcript;
- or wherein the regulatable intron comprises the sequence CNG/CNG-Xn-CNG/CNG, wherein Xn represents a sequence of length n nucleotides, wherein/represents the cleavage site such that the excisable sequence CNG-Xn-CNG is excised from the transcript upon splicing, and wherein the nucleotide at the 5′ end of the sequence Xn is a C or G, and wherein the expression product is not the XBP1 protein, Hac1 protein, bZIP60 protein or a homologue thereof.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.